National Training Fund (Amendment) Bill 2025: Second Stage
Seanad Éireann — 2025-12-11
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Mike Kennelly (FG), Labour Panel

I welcome the Minister back to the Seanad. There is a kind of festive feeling to this Bill. All is going well. I am pleased to contribute to this debate and to welcome the National Training Fund (Amendment) Bill 2025. As Fine Gael spokesperson on the committee for higher and further education, I commend the Minister on bringing this legislation to the House. The Bill is concise in its drafting but very significant in its impact.
As has been stated, the Bill makes a focused change to the National Training Fund Act 2000. It amends section 7 to allow payments from funds to include capital expenditure. We welcome that. It also allows for the acquisition of land, premises, furniture, equipment and the upgrading of construction and facilities. As the Minister stated, it can either be for retrofitting or a full refurbishment. I wonder if it is for full new builds.
This is a necessary adjustment. Until now, the fund could only be used for current expenditure. That restriction meant that while we could finance programmes and training schemes, we could not invest directly in the infrastructure we needed to deliver. This amendment corrects that limitation and ensures that the fund can support the physical capacity required for skills development.
I welcome the unlocking of the surplus. At the end of 2024 the fund held a surplus of approximately €1.7 billion. Budget 2025 set out a six-year plan to progressively spend €1.48 billion of that surplus between now and 2030. That is the reason we are here. This Bill is the legislative mechanism that allows the plan to proceed. I am only restating what has been included in that package, namely: €885 million in current funding for tertiary education and training; a €150 million per annum increase in higher education funding up to 2030; €235 million in one-off current funding for skills and apprenticeships. Wonderfully, there is a €600 million capital uplift to build and upgrade facilities in areas such as healthcare, veterinary training, further education and to support universal access to skills provision.
I listened to the Dáil debate on the Bill. Everyone welcomed the investment. When the allocation for the NTF is being hammered out, will the Minister and the Department take heed of what will benefit the skills sector most? The temptation might be to use or abuse the fund to plug funding gaps that could arise elsewhere in the third level sector. The National Training Fund, as the Minister stated, was created with a clear statutory purpose – to raise skills, support training and provide information on future skills needs. That purpose must remain central. Employers contribute to the fund through the levy, and they rightly expect that their contributions will be channelled into skills development not diverted to solve unrelated budgetary pressures.
If managed properly, this investment will: provide modern facilities for higher and further education institutions; expand capacity in critical-skills areas, such as healthcare and veterinary science; support universal access to training by ensuring infrastructure is fit for purpose; strengthen Ireland’s research base and help to attract and retain our talent; and ensure the fund continues to meet its statutory purpose of raising skills, supporting employment and providing information on future skills needs.
By allowing capital expenditure from the NTF, we are unlocking a surplus of nearly €1.5 billion to invest in facilities, infrastructure and the research capacity Ireland needs. Talent is our greatest natural resource. This legislation ensures that this fund can be used not only to finance programmes but also to build the physical foundations of our skills system.
Fine Gael welcomes this Bill and sees it is as a vital step in strengthening Ireland’s competitiveness, supporting lifelong learning and preparing our workforce for the challenges ahead. Therefore, I commend it to the House.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2025-12-11/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:27+00:00
Sitting date: 2025-12-11